Saturday, December 18, 2010

Growing older isn't always easy

I just read a wonderful story by Stacey McGlynn called Keeping Time. I was raised in a multi-generational home. My grandparents lived with us so initially Dennis in the story drove me crazy. I wanted to smack him for being clueless and pretty near heartless. Daisy, his 77 year old widowed mother, has some elderly glitches. She can no longer mow the lawn, fix things around the house, but she is far from useless. When she gets stuck on a ladder in her basement, Dennis determines this is the last straw and she must move into an assisted care facility.

Daisy has spirit and faces life changes with gusto. She decides rather than sell her home she will go find the man of her dreams. She met him and corresponded with him when she was a teenager. She doesn't know anything more about him, except he was a concert pianist. She visits long lost relatives in America and ends up sharing her quest with them.

This story will make you laugh, sigh and at times make you want to smack a few of the characters. For me Keeping Time was a coming of age story--for Daisy. McGlynn shows that there is value in all people and that doing the unexpected may bring you answers and inner peace.